She leads me down a dimly lit hallway, the carpet thin, almost bare in places. I should act revolted but I am so excited by what I have done or rather will be doing in a few moments.

I have never paid for a woman before, I've been with many but the newness of this has me feeling like a high school sophomore again.

In my excitement I failed to notice a couple of minor details. The first detail was the door was not locked and the second was the two burly men already inside.

Burly man one moved, locked and blocked the door while burly man two informed me I was to empty my pockets place everything on the bed if I did so my beating would not be as severe.

My grin widened exposing my very toothy smile, both men lay dead with the life choked out of them.

Yes, she was as tasty as I thought she would be.

Two years ago last Sunday, she exploded into his life with demands that weren’t predicated by anything but the desire to control. He’s moved away from her only to come back again because he can’t get enough of what he imagine she might be, what they could have if only there weren’t a thousand if only’s that mangle and wreck the chance of possible. And for an entire year, she was a voiceless internet stranger infiltrating his life from afar because she was unhappy in her marriage and he was a distraction. Her daughter was born and she disappeared for a spell, even though he kept up with all ways to tack her on to whatever he was doing, imagining that there was really something they could make from the obscene and insane relationship built on the desire for a power exchange. What worse is that she was so invisible in his life, so he mourned his loss in silent, unable to even begin to explain to anyone who she was or what she meant or how he lived on every single one of her words for an entire year without ever having seen her face.

Day 1: I’ve dreamt of this day for as long as I can remember. Though this journal will serve as a training guide upon my return, I’d first like to thank everyone involved in the selection process. I find I’m giddy like a child on Christmas morning despite currently being bedridden. Radiation sickness is subsiding but I can’t get the taste of metal out of my mouth; like the old copper pennies. Nothing in the handbook or training mentioned a metallic taste and it has me a little worried. By tomorrow I should be able to stomach some food. I can’t wait to get outside. 

Day 4: Feeling much better since my last entry. My spirits are high and the project is going extremely well. It’s a surreal feeling, as one might imagine. Everything is old, but brand new. It makes me feel…claustrophobic. I’m sure that’s hard to understand. I’ve never been much of a writer but the journal helps as a form of catharsis, give my thanks to the Army shrink. 

Day 7: Although I’ve studied the vocabulary extensively, I’m still having a difficult time communicating. People look at me strangely when I slip up and I sometimes feel as though they’re onto me - ridiculous, I know. I have to say, the food is amazing; everything here tastes better. 

Day 10: I broke protocol and went to a dance today, sue me. I had a great time. However, I can definitely say we underestimated the ‘poor hygiene’ chapter. I miss plumbing. 

Day 13: I’m beginning to experience mild headaches. The doctors in pre-screen hypothesized this might occur from sensory overload so I’m not terribly concerned. I didn’t expect to feel fatigued this early. I keep reminding myself I signed up for this and that when I return I’ll be a hero (that’s a joke, Cpt.).

Day 22: My health seems to be deteriorating. I haven’t left my room in a week. Massive sensitivity to light, headaches have increased to debilitating migraines. I’ll see a doctor tomorrow, although I’m not sure what good he’ll be able to do. 

Day 24: Something is wrong. I collapsed unconscious during the doctor’s visit. I woke up in a hospital and was treated for nose bleeds and head trauma before being released. Thirty-six more days; I can make it. 

Day 29: Have not left the room I’m renting. I’m losing track of the days. Afraid.

Day 9: feel confused. I know am supposed to write soething today.

DayeS: I can not remmeber what am to rite here. head hurts no better. ddaiy: am going to gat halp. now. send halp plese.

dayii: ive ive want home…

---

NOTE TO MEDICAL STAFF OF TRANS-ALLEGHENY LUNATIC ASYLUM: To those in receipt of this woefully disturbed and vehemently vexed patient found wandering in distress, hereupon referred to as ‘John Doe’, for whom asylum restraint is needful, please remand this curious document which accompanied him to the involuntary detention ward of the hospital for further study.

Given under my hand this 17th day of August, 1867

{signed} W.J. Bucknill, M.D.

I wait at the table, wondering how long my child will take? I am teaching him to hold a pencil but he keeps dropping it like a flake. You see there is dead end that our power tension has reached and suddenly everything has stopped working as the internet has been breached.

We are the last of our generation who knew what wonders body and mind can do. Their combination used to be ecstatic, a feeling my son never understood. We talked about invention and wrote some poetry; but all I see in him are zombie eyes that follow the phone's trajectory. Oh yes, there are some good things that technology got along, but now no one ever reads a book or hums into a song.

From Wheels to Deals, from travel to shovel, from books to business we had our embodied energy to harness. We could work in ice boxes and brave the heat of boiling metal furnace. But here I am struggling with the advancement of humankind, he has used his fingers so much on games that my son has lost his mind.

His friends laugh when they see a book, they try not to hold it. Their hands are not used to paper, nor do they know how to fold it?

It may seem so okay, when the child is just five and wants to play,

But here I talk about a man of twenty, digitalized and confined to a wireless array.

Studies, of course he did, but I no notebook to proudly show the ten on ten,

Everything is on-line or cloud nine, and at twenty he can no more hold a pen.

But us mother's always have hidden, a trick or two up our sleeve,

I agreed with him that internet is dead, for sometime let him grieve,

Then gave an apt knuckle on his head, and dragged the sombre man out of bed,

I made it clear in my Momster tone, "No work then you will not be fed."

He was aghast, to live in ways of past, and even considered me as bonkers because of grey.

I made it clear in a tone to fear, "Work or in this house, you won't stay!"

Here’s one for the Gaming Portal and gamers everywhere. Before we begin, I just want to let everyone know that there is a challenge created by NamelessNaiad that is about aliens. So when you have the chance please check it out and enter, it’s a really interesting and fun challenge. I’ve provided a link so you can head over. Now onto the review.

Oh yeah, I’m definitely into video games. Believe it or not I actually briefly discussed this game in one of my posts called ‘Vigilo Confido’. This is the motto for the fictional special ops forces that you control in the video game franchise. The motto loosing translates as “I am watchful. I am necessary”, which is fitting for this game series. Just a heads up, I’m only going to be talking about the current XCOM games not the ones that came out in the 1990s because I never played those. This review is strictly about XCOM: Enemy Unknown, XCOM: Enemy Within, and XCOM 2.

The story for the XCOM games is simple. Aliens have invaded the earth and you as the commander of this secret government defense network known only as XCOM must assemble its best soldiers to fight against the invaders. Unlike other games like Call of Duty, XCOM is a turn-based strategy game. The game operates like a chess board. You move your squad into position throughout a wide range of maps and wait for the enemy to make their move. Once you’ve eliminated all hostiles on the map, you win. But if the enemy eliminates all of your soldiers, you lose. You maybe thinking that’s not so bad. My soldiers will respawn next time. No. There is no next time. If your soldier dies in the game, they are dead throughout the whole game. You can potentially lose your best soldier just because you made a mistake by putting him in the wrong position. 

One of the best features in the XCOM series is the soldier customization. You can create your ultimate badass however you’d like by customizing their hair style, race, facial features, hair color, armor color, gender, even their names if you really wanted to. There are four different soldier classes your soldier can become: Sniper, which focuses on long-range attacks with a sniper rifle, Heavy, which deals with demolition and explosives, Support, which provides medical care for wounded soldiers, and Assault, which is better suited for close-range attacks. With each successful mission, your soldiers will progress through the ranks and unlock new abilities that can aid you during missions.

Additionally, you can build XCOM headquarters however you’d like by excavating underground and building new research and development facilities. You can also build and experiment with new weapons and gear that will add more firepower to your soldiers.

The challenge of this game is how to handle the situation. Funding comes from 16 different countries that you’re trying to protect and the best way to protect them is by launching satellites. If a country does not have a satellite, they will be targets for alien abductions, which is where you can send your soldiers in to stop them. The catch is you can only help one country per abduction mission and each country will provide awards that can benefit your base. Once you pick a country to rescue the other two get screwed over which raises their panic levels. If the country reaches maximum panic levels and does not receive any aid by the end of the month, they will withdraw from XCOM and will not fund you any longer. If you lose more than 8 countries it’s an automatic game over.

That’s what I love about XCOM. This game series is so challenging and so difficult there is a chance you can lose unless you find some sort of balance and keep upgrading your technology. Eventually, you’ll be able to get a handle on the gameplay to a point it feels like your elite soldiers could literally walk through Hell and not be phased.

When I played XCOM: Enemy Unknown I fell in love with this game. It was something different compared to what I usually play and it has since become one of my all time favorite games. If I had to make one complaint about it is that the ending was very anticlimatic. I felt it was too easy. I didn’t get the sense of tension as I did in the other missions. XCOM: Enemy Within is the expansion to Enemy Unknown where nothing else is different except you can genetically modify your soldiers with alien DNA and it adds a new soldier class called the MEC Trooper.

XCOM 2 is a completely different story entirely. XCOM 2 is set twenty years after the first game where humanity is under the control of the aliens. So even if you beat the first game you still get your ass handed back to you. See, this is what happens if Trump is president. This time XCOM is serving as a resistance movement against the alien overlords, moving from country to country in their mobile headquarters, a stolen alien ship called the Avenger. The gameplay is still the same but with new added twists, and it involves your team trying to stop the aliens from completing something called the Avatar Project. New missions, new customization options, new weapons and skills, XCOM 2 has easily surpassed its predecessor. The one downside I do have is that the game does suffer from performance problems. I noticed that the game doesn’t run so well on a couple of maps, but that’s mostly due to my laptop not up to speed with the graphics.

I don’t know what more I can say other than I love the XCOM series. This series always offers something different unlike Call of Duty which is literally the same damn game every time you play it. I’ve become engaged into the game itself to a point I’ve actually grown attachments to my customized soldiers. One day, everyone will hear the Ballad of XCOM and Earth’s courageous heroes like heavy specialist Olufemi “Yeti” Luthuli, his wife Bunta “Android” Luthuli, the comrade Dmitriy “The Russian” Vasilyev, the medic Chloe “Kitty” Johnson, the deadeye marksman Riku “Zero” Goto, and the thunder from down under David “Dice” White. Their legacy with live on to the next generation of heroes like wild-child Brittney “Before Cataclysm” Campbell, the Mexican hellblazer Humberto “Hellfire” Martinez, and the gifted psionic Adrian “Jedi” Nyte.

It’s intense, it’s challenging, it’s beautifully made, hell you can even get so attached to the soldiers you made to a point you’re saddened if they get killed. XCOM is a fantastic game series and I highly recommend any gamers here to give it a try. This series gets an automatic A+ from me.

So that’s my review of XCOM. What did you think? Are you a gamer too? What’s your favorite video game? Be kind and comment below. And if you like what you’ve read be sure to check out my other reviews and stay tuned for more!

“Good luck, Commander.”

#harrysituationreviews #XCOM #AGrade

Tactic 1: Win once, then refuse a rematch. No one said you have to keep fighting them just because they won't stay down.

Tactic 2: Don't fight them; sneak past them. They can't reset if they can't find you.

Tactic 3: Convince them to join your party. Clearly they are an invaluable asset.

Tactic 4: Hack into the code and disable resets. Of course, if you lose that won't be pretty...

Tactic 5: Beat them again and again and again until they rage quit. Even if it's an AI, it has to give up some time.

Tactic 6: Turn them to stone or trap them.

Tactic 7: Run away screaming IRL because clearly there is something NOT RIGHT about this game.

The reoccurrence of violence

Struggles and despises

Constant like the rain

Deeper than the tide is

We mask our fear in courage

To hide our shameful thoughts

Covered in false pride

We create emotional droughts

The sweetest things in life

We often over look

The deepest things in life

Are often found in books

I look deep within

To see if I am alive

I look too far inside

And can barely find life

What matters is always personal

True value is so subliminal

Each breath is worth the last

The future comes way too fast

He loves to make her laugh

She loves to make him smile

He's jaded from the past

She's broken, like a child

She makes him feel important

He makes her feel alive

Their lives have come together

A new life, side by side

[Poetry]

The light danced on the calm blue waters

As the woman dressed in white slowly saunters

To her nearby chair as all eyes turn to stare.

My heaving heart strains my chest more than I can bear

For one look at her and it is there, plain for all to see,

She is a woman at a ball of girls so very ripe with jealousy.

But those stares, those stares! All set with rage

For she not an heiress nor governess, but a simple page.

Perhaps it is the dress she wears that earns the unjust glare.

The flowing gown of fresh fallen snow a prompt

Of their honor tattered and purity swamped

With the lusts of youth. How they hate her

And spurn her for being lowly cur.

For only wearing what she should

I would pull away there unkind looks if I could

For here I sit with my future wife to be

And only hope that she takes a look me.

Thought and language go hand in hand.

The minute either is created the other is always present. Understanding is the only thing left to be discovered. We can think and speak in abstract ways. There will always be a need for understanding. Without understanding language will remain a thought and that thought will remain unheard.